


it's alright, it's alright, it's alright, it's alright

by Duck_Life



Category: X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: Extermination (2018), Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mind Control, Shatterstar is Genre Savvy, Singing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-23
Updated: 2019-08-23
Packaged: 2020-09-25 00:43:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20367832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Duck_Life/pseuds/Duck_Life
Summary: Rictor waits for Shatterstar to recover from the Hound brainwashing.





	it's alright, it's alright, it's alright, it's alright

Dr. Reyes is preparing to take Shatterstar’s blood pressure again when one frantic earthshaker stomps into the room, sending all of her equipment rattling. “Where is he? Is he okay? Where’s— ?”

“Shatterstar?” she guesses, eyeing Rictor. She points to the cot where the Mojoworlder is lying unconscious.

“ _ Dios _ ,” Rictor mumbles, rushing to his boyfriend’s side. Shatterstar is tall and well-muscled, but in his current state he looks so diminished. Small, almost. The black Hound marks stand out starkly against his fair complexion. “What… what are those lines on his face?”

“A side effect of the brainwashing, far as I can tell,” Cecilia explains, snapping her gloves off and coming to stand beside him. “The others have them, too.”

“So he's still… brainwashed? Getting knocked out didn't stop it?”

“I'm afraid not,” she says. “I've been running tests, Rictor, but so far… I can't find anything that actually stops it.”

Rictor mumbles something again and stares down at Shatterstar’s face, like he can will him awake, can will him back to his right mind. 

“I’m sorry,” Cecilia says, “I should have thought to call you. It’s just, everything’s happening so fast.”

“No, don’t worry about it,” he says, not looking up from Shatterstar. “Sam told me everything. I just… dammit, I should have been here. Stupid fucking job.” 

“You were at work?” she asks gently. 

“Yeah, like a damn flatscan,” he grumbles. “I  _ should’ve been here _ . Maybe I… I could’ve—”

“Could’ve gotten brainwashed just like Shatterstar,” she finishes the thought. “Don’t beat yourself up, Rictor. You were where you needed to be, and so was Shatterstar. Believe me, no one understands the need to have a  _ normal _ non-X-Men job more than I do. When I’m not dealing with  _ this _ bullshit—” she points to Shatterstar— “I moonlight at a clinic.” Ric looks genuinely surprised. “Yeah! And sure, sometimes I wonder, ‘What if I had been here when XYZ was going down?’, stuff like that. But then I think, ‘What if I hadn’t been at the clinic last week when Mr. Hernandez came in with heart palpitations?’ I saved a man from a life-threatening heart condition.” 

“Oh.” 

“Yeah,” Cecilia says again. “So. What do you do?” 

Ric shuffles his feet and rubs the back of his neck. “I, uh. I own a bar.” 

Cecilia doesn’t look disapproving or surprised. She just nods. “Stress is a huge factor in a lot of medical conditions. Everybody needs a place where they can relax and blow off steam.” 

“I guess,” Rictor shrugs. “There’s other stuff, too. I keep tabs on the mutants in Queens, keep kids safe.” 

Her face clouds over, like she’s remembering the day Bobby Drake saved her from Operation: Zero Tolerance and changed her life forever. “Like I said,” she replies. “You were where you were needed.” 

“I guess,” Rictor says, his eyes on Shatterstar. His hand comes up to lightly trace the black lines on ’Star’s face. “He’s…” His voice breaks; he coughs and starts over. “He’s not from here. He doesn’t have the kind of psychic shielding the average person has. And he definitely doesn’t have the type of shields that I have, or Cyclops has, or your typical telepath.” 

Cecilia watches him, her brow furrowed. She isn’t pushing, but she definitely wants to hear more. Anything that might be able to help her help her patient. 

“This isn’t the first time he’s been controlled, taken over,” Rictor explains, his thumb sweeping over Shatterstar’s cheek. For one bizarre moment, he wishes this were a Disney movie, and he could just kiss ’Star and break the curse. But reality is twisted and ugly, and requires patience, and he will sit in here and wait until Shatterstar is himself again. “Just keeps happening to him, the poor guy.”

“Then I know it’ll mean a lot for him to be with someone he loves when he wakes up,” Cecilia says. 

Shatterstar does wake up, but he’s not happy to see Rictor. Actually, he doesn’t seem to see Rictor at all. One second he’s lying prone on the table, and in the next second he bolts upright, a strangled cry ripped from his throat. 

“ _ Kill the mutant _ ,” he snarls, lunging madly toward Cecilia, who throws up her forcefield. “ _ Kill… kill the mutant _ …” 

“Rictor!” Cecilia yells from behind her forcefield. “That syringe next to the sink, it’s a sedative. Should take him out!”

Rictor stands there paralyzed with horror, just watching Shatterstar go berserk. He looks frozen, eyes fixed on the sight before him.

“Rictor!” Cecilia yells again. “Come on!”

Ric shakes himself out of it and sprints to the sink, grabbing the syringe. As he draws closer to Shatterstar, though, the Mojoworlder’s warrior instincts kick in and he whirls around, teeth bared. He looks like a total stranger— but also, in some ways, painfully similar to the boy he was when he first came to Earth. 

“’Star,” Rictor says helplessly, keeping a firm grip on the sedative. “It’s  _ me _ .” 

“ _ Kill the mutant _ ,” Shatterstar howls, surging toward him. At the last second, Rictor jabs the syringe into Shatterstar’s neck. 

He watches the man he loves float off, and then he catches him and carries him back to the infirmary cot. Shatterstar’s hollow bones make him light— far lighter than he looks, and definitely less than the weight of everything he means to Rictor. How is it possible that so much life, so much joy and sadness and pain and love, can fit into just 90 pounds? Ric’s never understood it. 

“I could get out the restraints,” Cecilia suggests. 

“No,” Rictor says defensively, smoothing back Shatterstar’s hair. “No, I can’t… he shouldn’t be tied up.” Cecilia gives him a skeptical look. “I handled it this time, right? If he wakes up again, I can handle it.” He sighs. “Like I said. Stuff like this has happened before. And I’ve… I’ve been there for it. I’ll be here for this.” 

  
  


Cecilia gives Rictor a rundown of how the twins’ powers work— creating false memories, triggering the walls to break down at just the right time.

It had to have been easier with Shatterstar than with the others. The twins weren't exactly working with a blank canvas. They had 17-plus years of torture, torment and brainwashing under Mojo V to work with. 

Whatever Jean Grey and the rest of the X-Men are doing must work, because the harsh black lines fade from Shatterstar’s face. Something in his expression softens, quiets, but he still doesn’t come to right away. 

When Shatterstar wakes up for real, there’s a momentary grace period where his eyes meet Julio’s and he’s just happy. Happy to be alive, happy to see the man he loves. But then everything comes rushing back and his bright eyes grow darker, his face twists into a horrified mask of anguish. “No no no no no no no no no,” he mumbles, an endless stream. 

Cecilia hovers around him, anxious. “Shatterstar, I need you to stay calm, okay?”

“No no no no no no,” Shatterstar bleats, his eyes roaming wildly from Rictor’s face to his own hands, like he’s reliving it all, the fighting, trying to kill Julio yet again. “ _ No _ , no, please, no, no, no.” 

“Dr. Reyes… uhm, Cecilia, could you give us a minute?” Rictor asks, exhaustion drawing his face into a pinched, pale copy of itself. Cecilia nods and leaves, tossing back one worried glance before walking out the door to check in with Jean and the X-Men. 

Rictor turns his attention to Shatterstar, who looks like he’s veering on the precipice of a full-blown panic attack. “’Star?”

“Don’t look at me,” Shatterstar grunts, covering his face with his hands. He’s sitting up on the cot now, hunched over like he can make himself smaller than he is. 

Rictor reaches for him, wants to smooth his rumpled hair, wants to pull him close and never let go. “Babe—”

“ _ Please _ do not look at me I cannot have you looking at me please Julio please look away,” Shatterstar rattles off, his voice dry, scraping. So Rictor turns to face the wall, his back to Shatterstar, feeling awful and useless. Shatterstar breathes in rattling gasps, still mumbling a litany of “no, no, no, no.” 

Rictor evens out his own breathing, tries to think of what  _ he’d _ want to hear in Shatterstar’s situation. “You didn’t kill anyone,” he says, still staring at the wall, unsure if Shatterstar is even listening or if he’s too far gone into his own horrified spiral of doubt and guilt. “Sammy handled it. And you know… ’Star, I’m not sure if you know this, but Sam is  _ nigh invulnerable when he’s blastin’ _ . Has he ever mentioned that?”

He waits for Shatterstar to laugh, even just to expel air through his nose,  _ something _ . Shatterstar keeps repeating, “No, no, no, no.” 

“So he’s fine,” Rictor continues. “Cecilia’s fine.  _ I’m  _ fine. And the X-Babies all got sent back where they belonged. Fight’s over, ’Star. We get to go home.” 

“ _ No _ ,” Shatterstar says again, but this time he actually sounds like he’s responding. That’s something, at least. 

“Talk to me,” Rictor says. “Tell me what you’re feeling.” 

Shatterstar drags in a deep breath. It sounds like he might be crying, and it’s so hard for Rictor to keep looking away. “I feel like a gun.” 

Rictor’s heart aches. “You’re not,” he says, his voice hoarse. “I promise you, you’re not. You’re a person. Someone got in your head, and that sucks, but it’s gonna be okay. We got you back.” Rictor hears the click of his tongue and the sharp intake of breath, like ’Star’s going to say something, but then there’s only silence. “What?”

“I should have been able to bring myself back,” Shatterstar says, voice burning with fury. “I should have been stronger.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s  _ not _ okay, Rictor,” Shatterstar says. “I could have killed Guthrie. I could have killed  _ you _ . Why couldn’t I stop?” 

“These things happen,” Rictor says. “I know that sounds batshit insane, but look at our lives. This is the kind of stuff that happens all the time. We take it and we roll with it, right?”

“Star Wars: Return of the Jedi,” Shatterstar says, living up to his nature of never saying anything remotely comprehensible. “Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge,” he continues. “Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, Transformers: The Last Knight.”

“’Star, what the hell are you talking about,” Julio says, tired.

“Instances in which the hero fights his brainwashed friend, family member or lover and attempts to break through their mind control by using the connection they share,” Shatterstar says, obviously quoting something. “Often accompanied by the phrase, ‘I know you’re in there somewhere.’ The brainwashed party is encouraged to fight their programming and wins out due to the power of love.”

“Alright, Shatterstar—”

“Why doesn’t it work with me?” Shatterstar says desperately. 

Rictor can’t take it anymore. “’Star, is it okay if I look at you now?” 

“... Acceptable, yes.” 

Rictor whirls around, wanting to hold ’Star and hide him somewhere where none of this shit can ever hurt him again. The sight he sees only breaks his heart even more 

Shatterstar’s eyes are wide and bleak, and he looks so much like the wild-eyed kid who used to turn cartwheels in the desert all those years ago. “What is… why could I not  _ stop hurting you _ ?” he says, confused and hurt, all tangled up. “I don’t love you enough. I don’t love you enough to stop hurting you.”

“Hey,” Rictor says, trying to make his voice as soft as possible. It’s hard. “I don’t think that’s true.”

“Then  _ why _ ?” Shatterstar asks. 

Rictor wishes he had a good answer for him. "I don't know, man. We can't all be Dark Phoenix. Or, or Luke Skywalker or Samwise or whoever the hell else, alright? The important thing is that you're okay now."

Shatterstar nods, but he doesn't look like he fully buys it. 

“I love you,” Rictor reminds him, bringing one hand up to ’Star’s face. Shatterstar’s eyes follow his every move. His own hand comes up to cover Rictor’s. “My psychic defenses are just, like, more buff than yours,” he says, smiling weakly. “And I love you no matter what, yeah? I just care that you’re okay.” 

“I love you, too,” Shatterstar says, but he still looks miserable. “I think I love you as much as I possibly can.” Teaching the interdimensional refugee that love made you  _ strong _ , not just vulnerable, that was easy in retrospect. The hard part is helping him understand what that means. Now Shatterstar seems to think that any perceived “weakness” could be attributed to a deficiency of love. 

“That’s more than enough for me,” Rictor promises, leaning forward to kiss him. “Besides. Betcha you’ll love me even more tomorrow.” Shatterstar tilts his head, confused, and Rictor takes both his hands and sways back and forth, almost-kind-of-sort-of dancing while he hums, while he sings, “ _ I love you more today than yesterday/But not as much as tomorrow _ …” Shatterstar knows the song, likes the song, lets Rictor pretend they are dancing. Lets Rictor pretend they aren’t in the infirmary, and that Shatterstar has never tried to kill him. 

And he pretends, too. 


End file.
